Working girl

Sort of.

   This school year I am dipping my toes back into the turbulent waters of supply teaching.  I have been an occasional teacher for a long, long time.  I've had many long term occasional positions and many of them have been in ONE (yes, I said one!) classroom for an entire year at a time.  My last classroom was a junior/intermediate French Immersion when I was pregnant with Jack.  When I finished that assignment I was pretty sure that I would not be returning to teaching again.  It was that difficult.

     Fast forward 2 years.  I spent my maternity year off with Jack, and that extended into another year.  We moved to a new house in a new city and I just wasn't feeling up to the task of balancing work life with home life.  This year though, everything is different.  My girls are in school and the baby boy is not such a "baby" anymore.  It was time to go back to work- even if just a few days a month.

      I am not teaching regularly.  Just a day here and a day there and most of those days are at my old school, where I have the "lay of the land" so to speak.  I am learning a lot about myself as a teacher and as a mother.   Even better, I have realized that even though I feared that being off for the better part of the past 6 years would turn my brain to mush and dull my slight edge, I am in fact a better teacher for this time spent away.  I see things differently now.  I am less frazzled by the noise.  I am more tolerant.  I am grateful!  My days in the classroom, though few, are a sort of "vacation" from my at-home-parenting.  For this, I am thankful.

     So I may not be making great financial gains in this foray back into teaching, but I am getting a taste for the working world again.  This is my attempt to find balance in my personal and professional life.  Bonus?  I get those 40 minute lunches!!!